


Palebro (the Kirk Ain't Got Nothing On This remix)

by DoctorV



Category: Homestuck
Genre: AU, F/M, Flushed Romance | Matesprits, Gen, Ouroboros Mix Lightning Round, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Red Romance, Remix, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-31
Updated: 2011-12-31
Packaged: 2017-10-28 13:59:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/308595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoctorV/pseuds/DoctorV
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Waking up to a new alien face isn't exactly conducive to maintaining one's cool, but a Strider fresh out of cryo is the chillest thing since ice-nine..."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Palebro (the Kirk Ain't Got Nothing On This remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lantadyme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lantadyme/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Laundry](https://archiveofourown.org/works/165299) by [lantadyme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lantadyme/pseuds/lantadyme). 



Waking up to a new alien face isn't exactly conducive to maintaining one's cool, but a Strider fresh out of cryo is the chillest thing since ice-nine, so he pops the tab on some frozen nonchalance while his swag thaws out. An uplifting of one brow and he greets...his new "owner". Because he can see a smear of green on her glove and he knows what color his former "employer" bled.

Once his vision clears enough that he can see beyond kaleidoscope spots and blobs of color, he gives her (her? the mammaries say yes, but the common-sense-when-dealing-with-aliens says don't assume) points for swag of her own for those bitching red shades. He is instantly filled with renewed confidence in their future "partnership" (no he's not), because surely no one possessed of a mind that says "yes, this is good, wear these" could possibly share any of the more uncool and unsavory traits that his former "master" possessed (how intoxicated would one have to be to believe that?).

Indeed, surely a brave new world awaits him in this new alien's "employ".

(He is just falling down all these mental air quotes.)

\-----

He waits till his own personal troll taskmaster is otherwise occupied, and so much so that she won't notice any covert employment of the long-range communications, before he sends a message to Dave. Lets him know he's changed hands and how to find him if absolutely, this better be a fucking emergency bro, necessary. Dave answers immediately with a hasty and misspelled query as to whether Bro needs sprung. Which means his young prodigal protégé is either somewhere safe or suffering an overabundance of the same bullshit bravado that kids his age are so full of. Either way, he can extrapolate that at least Dave remains unbroken, regardless of immediate personal safety.

Then he thinks about the question, really thinks, and decides that nah, he's fine where he is. Redglare's got an alien ladyboner for _justice_ , not torture, though the line between them sometimes gets blurred in her pursuit of and the lady is wicked-deadly with a rope. Still, she's never come after him in the name of discipline just because she's in a bad mood, never smacked him around because it's her "right" and she doesn't need an excuse.

And anyway, she's a hot mess and her ship's in desperate need of some TLC, which she seems woefully incapable of noticing, much less taking care of. Let it never be said that Bro Strider ditched a lady in need. So he tells his little bro he's chill as an extended metaphor kept in deep cryo on an ice planet orbiting a dead sun. Dave accepts his decision, because his word is law and shapes the very reality of the younger Strider.

Then Dave comes out with a "so you tappin that plush alien rump" and he is very suddenly _absolutely not_ thinking about how tight Redglare's pants are and how firm her derriere is. That isn't even pointed denial, he is instead thinking of how pointy her elbows are. The neophyte's whole body seems built entirely of sharp angles, a sadistic architect's masterpiece, pointing ever inexorably at the only roundness on her, showcasing it for the benefit of anyone allowed to see her without her slitted, ass-hiding skirt.

He happens to be among that select number by dint of living with her and being the one to do the laundering.

Welp, _now_ he's thinking of alien rump. Firm gray tush topping long, lean legs, bent over to pull up teal spandex, alien junk _almost_ peeking out at him before he flashsteps down the hall and hopes she doesn't realize he was there.

It's been far too long since he responded, so he taps out something suitably witty about the choice new bling his sugar momma has provided. Then of course he has to reassure Dave that he's already reprogrammed the thing to let him know when she's checking his location, of course he has, what kind of chump does he take him for? "Oh ye of little faith, little bro. Your petty fidians offend my delicate ego."

He doesn't have any way to let Dave contact him yet, so he tells the boy to hang tight and wait for him to get in touch again. A few parts bought, scrounged, and stolen here and there and he'll have his very own communication array piggy-backing ninja-esque off the ship's systems. Enough to give Dave a frequency to ping.

Bro tells him to keep safe, wrapped up in rhyming couplets, and Dave lays down a thick layer of metaphor over a reassurance that he's snug as a grub and plans to stay that way and anyway is far too hot shit to ever be in danger in the first place. Oh the hubris of youth. Then his "bling" vibrates silently against the back of his neck, she of the crimson ogle searching for him, and he's off the hacked array with a sufficiently chill farewell so as to not alert Dave to the necessary urgency of his departure.

Once all trace of him using the communication array has been erased, he retrieves his mop from the wall it was leaning against and goes back to his ready-made excuse for being in there: the floor is filthy, and who better than the ship's resident "slave" to unfilthify it?

As he directs an unhurried nod of greeting at the bosslady, he reflects that one of these days, the irony will wear off of all his mental air quotes. Today is not yet that day, though.

\-----

The engine whines like an animal in pain, all "help me, Brobi-Wan Kenbrobi, you're my only hope" and he can't help but get all up in its business. It's Dr. Bro to the rescue, elbow-deep in ship viscera, grease leaving blood-spatter stains all over his shirt.

Whistling while he works, he decides he needs to do something about the quality of the available music on board Redglare's ship, IE _none_. He also needs to teach the autochef that there are food groups besides "red," Jesus H. on a disco stick.

\-----

He has to mix it himself, but he finally has a decent cache of music at his disposal, praise be to all the gods of rhythm and sick beats. And just like that, none of his mental air quotes matter anymore, because he's in his element again. It gets under his skin and washes him clean, mind cleansed of impurities, and he can breathe all the way to the bottom of his lungs again. It realigns his chi, presents him with his zen all wrapped in an ironic red bow, and shoos away the last gasping fumes of forced badass chill he's been running on without even realizing it.

Bro Strider is reborn to the pulse of dubstep, a bleached phoenix rising from the ashes of capture and slavery.

\-----

It's not his neatest patch job, but the wiring in the laundry room is shit so he works with what he has, filling his workspace with his own personal path to enlightenment paved with throbbing bass. Okay it's more of a buzz, but he can still feel it deep in his bones, dancing confident flirtation with the healthy hum of the ship's engine. Then it's joined by another vibration, the slave collar he called bling so he wouldn't have to face the reality of where and what he currently is.

That reality has been faced. It's been faced, winked at, and sent home with a weird squirmy feeling in its tummy like maybe it needs to rethink what it finds sexy.

His slave collar buzzes, mistress on the lookout for him, and he breathes in the smell of the sudsy water before him, finding his center and giving it a casual "sup". Yeah, he's got this.

He's got it and he rolls with it, even when it throws a curveball at him in the shape of the _Lady_ Redglare's toothsome mouth against his. Just when he thought he was getting a hang of those quadrants, too. Suddenly he's playing four square and hitting a homerun. Touchdown, Bro Strider.

**Author's Note:**

> I doubt anyone cares, but my unused/unmentioned backstory on what Dave's up to while Bro is being the main character is that Dave escaped whatever bad shit he was stuck in and fell in with a secret group of Signless followers. Because LOL, irony, Redglare's a follower and Bro and Dave will probably be reunited some time when she checks in with them blah blah blah. Also, Dave is getting his pimp on with Terezi and Karkat. Because they're there too.
> 
> ...Yeah I'll just be over here. Covering my head with my arms. Pretending I totally didn't just type all that.


End file.
